a sneaky diary for the old gang

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Wednesday August 10, 2011 · 9:49 PM PDT

2011/08/10 · 21:49

WELL WITH MB LEAVING and all attention turned there I thought I'd sneak in an announcement regarding the former diary series here known as Saturday Night Uforia that's meant to be and hopefully is seen by those who subscribed.

The announcement is that the diary series is now at its own site. I've tried contacting the old gang through OT replies to comments, sometimes successfully and sometimes not.

And in an effort to waste a minimum of Marcos' kilobytes, that is all.

My July 4th in prison, or what it really takes to be a foster family

two roads

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Sunday July 04, 2010 · 8:03 PM PDT

2010/07/04 · 20:03

(reposted)
I HAD ORIGINALLY PROMISED SEVERAL KOSSACKS that I would write this diary on the ins and outs of foster care, and becoming a foster dad (or mom) weeks ago. I'm late in posting this because I spent a good deal of time trying to figure out the best way into this complex subject.

And then Friday, July 4th, as I made my weekly five-hours-there-five-hours-back trip to visit my (former foster) son in prison, I gave the matter more thought. And then during the visit, a life-changing event took place, and I realized the real nitty gritty of the matter could only be conveyed from a personal perspective.

And though my tale will include the training, the licensing, the minutia of the process, it will be have to be ferreted out from within this true story, the story of a boy I'll call 'Jack', my former foster kid and the son of my heart.

This is a very long diary, and not for the feint of heart or those who want such things boiled down into feel-good four-color brochures and factoids (though it has factoids as well). So proceed if you want to learn a little something about the subject -- but like being a foster parent itself, it will take a personal commitment to seeing it all the way through...

two roads

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Monday May 31, 2010 · 4:29 PM PDT

2010/05/31 · 16:29

THIS IS A DIARY ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED on January 6, 2007, during a time when my primary activity -- outside of tending to my son -- was keeping the human cost of the war in Iraq front and center.

I was pulled back to it today, as I always am on Memorial Day, but this time particularly by OPOL's rec-list diary.

I am an ardent admirer of OPOL, as he himself knows. But I was struck by this:

Some of them are just naive kids caught up in something evil and deadly that they don't begin to understand. That's not to take anything away from those who served or from the real heroes. They do exist...but they're rare.

And for the first time ever, I must disagree with my good friend. For during the time I was publishing diaries on Iraq -- under a former user name -- I came across an untold number of stories of the real heroes, who were by no means rare. Some of them were soldiers, some of them were those who waited at home. But they all were heros, for reasons having very little to do with war.

This is a repeat of the story of some of them...

two roads

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Tuesday May 11, 2010 · 10:18 AM PDT

2010/05/11 · 10:18

ALTHOUGH SUPREME COURT nominee Elena Kagan comes without a record of written judicial opinions, according to her written answers submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee in February 2009, her views on marriage equality match that of the president:

1. As Solicitor General, you would be charged with defending the Defense of Marriage Act. That law, as you may know, was enacted by overwhelming majorities of both houses of Congress (85-14 in the Senate and 342-67 in the House) in 1996 and signed into law by President Clinton.

a. Given your rhetoric about the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy—you called it "a profound wrong—a moral injustice of the first order"—let me ask this basic question: Do you believe that there is a federal constitutional right to same- sex marriage?

Answer: There is no federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage.

Her answer was definitive and unambiguous...

two roads

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Saturday March 13, 2010 · 4:22 PM PST

2010/03/13 · 16:22

THOSE REGULARS READING THE TITLE could justifiably assume that this means time for another short vacation. But this time is different. This time it means it's time for this series to make a break, a clean break away from Daily Kos.

The reasons are several. Interest in this series here has noticeably waned hereabouts, providing ideal timing for this series’ exit. But it is an exit driven more than anything else by the, let us say, evolving nature of Daily Kos. It just ain't the same kind of neighborhood it was when I first joined in 2004, or even when this series began in 2008.

So it’s on to its own website, which hopefully will be ready in the next couple of months. I’ll still be here commenting and perhaps diarying on things that strike my fancy.

To the regulars: you all know how highly I regard you, and the heartfelt affection I have for you.

And I hope we'll meet up again, a couple of months down the road.

two roads

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Saturday March 06, 2010 · 5:56 PM PST

2010/03/06 · 17:56

Above: From the Waukesha Daily Freeman, Wisconsin, August 2, 1952.

NINETEEN FIFTY-TWO might be remembered for many things, large and small. The election of Dwight Eisenhower as President of the United States. Fifty thousand American families afflicted by Polio. The British A-bomb. The first issue of Mad magazine. The theory of the Big Bang.

But for those of a certain bent, 1952 will also be remembered for the second great 'flying saucer flap' which climaxed with the reports of radar and visual sightings over the nation's capital in late July.

The story of that year is now available in declassified government files. But for the public back then -- at a time when only one in three families had a television set -- the story was mostly found in the newspapers and magazines.

This then is a look back at those stories, as they first appeared in print...

two roads

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Saturday February 27, 2010 · 7:00 PM PST

2010/02/27 · 19:00

Above: From the Hutchinson News-Herald, Kansas, July 31, 1952.

This then is a look back at those stories, as they first appeared in print...

two roads

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Saturday February 20, 2010 · 7:03 PM PST

2010/02/20 · 19:03

Above: From the News-Palladium, Benton Harbor, Michigan, July 30, 1952.

This then is a look back at those stories, as they first appeared in print...

two roads

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Saturday February 13, 2010 · 6:57 PM PST

2010/02/13 · 18:57

Above: From the North Adams Transcript, Massachusetts, July 30, 1952.

This then is a look back at those stories, as they first appeared in print...

two roads

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Saturday February 06, 2010 · 6:58 PM PST

2010/02/06 · 18:58

THE SEVEN YEARS FOLLOWING the end of World War II brought to the world only a turbulent and troubled peace.

By 1946 Winston Churchill was warning that the Soviets had lowered an "iron curtain" across Europe. In 1948 a Russian blockade of Berlin carried with it the potential to ignite World War III with each of the 200,000 American relief flights over Soviet-controlled territory. In early 1949 the North Atlantic Treaty was signed, declaring that any attack against Britain, France or other western nations would be treated as an act of war against the U.S. itself. By the end of 1949, communist revolutionaries had won control of China, and Russia had set off it's first atomic weapon. Close on its heels the first war between these new global forces erupted in deadly earnest in Korea, where 'MiG alley' became the world's first battlefield for jet fighters and the superior performance of Russian MiGs shocked the American public.

Yet the largest and longest military press conference since World War II would be about none of these, but instead address reports of aerial intruders -- commonly labeled 'flying saucers' -- over the nation's capital in early summer, 1952.

This is the story of that press conference...

two roads

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Saturday January 30, 2010 · 6:54 PM PST

2010/01/30 · 18:54

Above: From the Daily Telegram, Eau Claire, Wisconsin, July 29, 1952.

This then is a look back at those stories, as they first appeared in print...

two roads

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Saturday January 23, 2010 · 6:57 PM PST

2010/01/23 · 18:57

Above: Featurette from the Sunday newspaper supplement Parade Magazine, July 27, 1952, with text sections enlarged at bottom of image.

This then is a look back at those stories, as they first appeared in print...

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a sneaky diary for the old gang

My July 4th in prison, or what it really takes to be a foster family

The Carriage Held But Just Ourselves

Kagan: No constitutional right to marriage equality

Saturday Night Uforia: Time for a break

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 11)

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 10)

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 9)

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 8)

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 7)

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 6)

Saturday Night Uforia: In the news, 1952 (Part 5)